Ask Auntie Leila: The Bossiness Cure

Do you know a cure for bossiness? If there were a Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle chapter on bossiness, my four-year-old daughter would be the bossy child! In her (my?) defense, she is the eldest child (I also have a two-year-old boy and a three-month-old boy). My husband and I are both the eldest. Three of her four grandparents are the eldest. AND the majority of her great-grandparents are also the eldest. Is there any hope?! Someone has to be the eldest after all, but she does come from a long line of them…

I know that the beginning at least is for me to examine myself. On the one hand I know I need to work on speaking charitably toward her and toning down my bossiness. But on the other hand, I am her mother, and she does need to mind me — which sometimes requires a (very) firm tone. What can I do?? She bosses around everyone — her brothers, parents, grandparents, friends, etc. Not that we do as she says (especially when delivered in that tone), but she is relentless…

Thank you for this beautiful ministry that you do through your blog. I’m not sure how I came across it originally, but I’m so glad I did! You have made a big impact on these early years of my marriage and motherhood, and I am extremely grateful!

Thank you for any insight on the bossiness cure :o)
Gratefully,

Mrs.Bossé Pushedaround

Dear Bossé,

Gosh, there must be a chapter somewhere in Mrs. P-W that addresses this! Is there not? Calling all Piggle-Wiggle scholars!

I will do my best; I can relate to your issue, as I am also bossy and have some bossy kids.

Maybe I can characterize this problem. We realized an issue (actually, I credit the Chief with this one) with one of our kids in particular, who is also very kind, so fear not! — when it became clear that she somehow had the notion that everything that was said or that happened required a response from her. In her defense, she was, like your daughter, still very young.

Once you notice this trait, you can begin to remedy. (In oneself: do I think I need to comment on everything that is said? Suddenly, do I realize that I am doing just this? People can chat amongst themselves — this can be a revelation! Just let people do their thing! Hmm… novel idea… )

The moment of truth hits on that day when you realize: you’re sitting around the dining room table with everyone, and comment from young Johnny gets a response from Miss Bossy, comment from Grandma Bossy gets a response from Miss Bossy, etc…

Every interaction has to go through her!

Sometimes it helps to bring the picture into focus to consider the family as a kind of pack.

When a person has a rather choleric temperament, he can take on the alpha role (yes! even tots!). And the temperament of others either enables that person, for instance if the parents tend to be rather phlegmatic or too melancholic to rouse themselves to the necessary pitch of resistance and proper benign dominance — or gives rise to conflict, if a parent is also somewhat choleric. Once you identify the temperament/alpha issue, you can take steps.

You and your husband are the “alpha pair” and that (vital, indispensable, God-given) status is mostly conveyed by gestures and quiet admonishments. Simply putting your hand on a child’s head, looking away at a moment when they are getting geared up, raising an eyebrow, emitting a well placed “tsk” — these gestures are worth a thousand nags.

Note well: when correctly ordered, each temperament* has its benefits and blessings, so teaching self control is absolutely critical. That bossy choleric person will manage things very well for you and for the world when she’s older, although you will always have to be sure that she isn’t taking on more than is appropriate, until she is no longer your problem, having reached the age of majority! Even then, your wise, calm voice will be of immense help to her.

As the alpha pair, you are the arbiters of the interactions in your home; this is a teaching matter. When things are humming along, you let everyone do their thing and all is well. There are rarely plateaus of calm in a family, however! So when one person steps out of line and takes an inopportune role (like bossing), you can help her get control over her tendencies.

So one thing is to simply say, “Be quiet and let others speak.” Head her off at the pass. It might take a week to get a little traction on this new habit, — and maybe more like years, so see how it goes. It might take repeated gentle reminders and explanations to get the message through. “You can’t speak up whenever you feel like it. Listen first to see if you are being helpful.” “You don’t have to say anything right now.” “He’s littler than you and it takes him a while to say or do this — you were the same way when you were little. Let’s be patient.” “He can do it.” “Mama said, ‘be quiet’.”

Then of course, let her know when she’s been helpful; encourage her when she handles things well, because you know, our faults are our strengths; our strengths are our faults. You can’t actually change how you deal with life, you can only somehow, with the help of others and God, make the way you deal better.

When she’s actually bossing, quietly go over and remove her from the situation (and work on that raised eyebrow so that you can manage from afar). Explain that she wasn’t letting her brother do things his own way. Everyone has to have a chance to figure things out for themselves.

You know, one thing I appreciate about the Arabic culture I half-grew up with (when I was with my father) is the paramount importance placed on showing respect to elders. Sure, pertness can be cute, and Americans seem to have a good deal of patience with such behavior, but at some point, you just say, “that’s disrespectful — stop.” Say it quietly and keep saying it as the occasion demands, without embarrassing her but without letting her off the hook, either.

This is a work in progress. So sometimes there’s naughtiness and you prudently just wait until later and say, “Sweetie, in this situation I don’t want you to be telling your elders what to do.” Correction should rarely be carried out in front of others in this case, because she doesn’t mean it — she’s learning.

Give the words for a better way of saying it: “Grandma, can I take your coat for you?” (In contrast to: “put your coat over there, Grandma!”)

In the next couple of years you want to gradually give her the idea that she ought to be using her above-average observational and management skills to figure out how she can help people and make them more comfortable.

This is really teaching manners. Manners are not some form that we use to get points from people; they are set ways of behaving that are designed to put people at their ease. Manners are the way we show kindness, and kindness is what makes family life pleasant. Our children need to learn to serve in practical and concrete ways and to be kind! It’s okay to talk about this with them in a gentle way.

Scolding and bossing are rude when the person doesn’t have authority (and need to be carefully controlled when the person does!); it’s as simple as that. Life becomes intolerable when you are a little kid and everyone is scolding you! We have to make life pleasant for the littles!

Don’t worry. Lots of four-year-old girls are this way. Younger brothers have to suffer a lot, but what doesn’t kill them makes them stronger.

Keep thinking of ways to express how each person fits into the family structure — ultimately everyone relaxes when the roles are clear. You are on the right track in identifying the problem, and it will sort itself out little by little.

Thanks for writing! God bless,

Leila

Later I got a follow-up (and I do love to hear how things are going!):

I found myself coming back to this email from you today, after a particularly bossiness-filled day in our home. Once again, your advice proved to be a treasure, and exactly what I needed (again!).

Truly, thank you. You hit the nail on the head with my daughter, who happens to fit into both examples you gave – alpha dog (or trying to be) AND feels that all interactions must go through her. But you have given me hope to begin again tomorrow :o)

God bless you and your family. And very best wishes and prayers for your expecting daughters!

Bossé

Carry on, parents of the world!

*Want to know more about temperaments? I highly recommend this book, The Temperament God Gave You. (This is an affiliate link — thanks for shopping with us!)

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Any additional advice for a bossy 10 year old male firstborn? We have been correcting him for years, yet he still feels as though he has to be involved in every conversation (even those between adults!). He is also quick to admonish his three younger sisters, before my husband and I can even open our mouths to speak to them ourselves.

Tori, the advice is the same!
Situational awareness — it’s time to look around and see how you can be kind, alert, and helpful
Manners — 10 years old is time to start acting appropriately and with refinement, noticing others’ needs
Restore alpha order — the alpha pair are quietly in charge. Check your alpha status.
Also — this child is rarin’ to go — give him more responsibility and appreciate his ability to figure things out by letting him loose on some real problems that you — if you are like me! — almost certainly need to be solved.

Oh I do like this one. My eldest is in the “everything must go through me” category and this gives me confidence. She is also in the “you are not parenting my siblings properly” category and we are still working on that one. She has had the blessing/ curse of being the first and thus overly parented.

My eldest has a great need to be in control so our go to phrase has become “It’s not your job”. Since having a defined jobs seems to help her feel the world will not spiral out of control if she doesn’t control every little detail. Its my job to make sure her sisters toe the line. She’s eight and she’s getting better but it is hard.

thank you thank you thank you for this post! I am the oldest daughter of an oldest daughter raising an oldest daughter. The bossiness goes DEEP, and I am learning about myself and trying trying trying to help my oldest. I love your approach to manners and I do some of the things you are recommending but I appreciate more ideas and the overall vision you offer – sometimes my husband and I just get so annoyed with her and don’t know how to explain what needs to change – the advice and words you give for being QUIET ALREADY is so useful and kind. Sometimes I get right down on my daughter’s eye level and remind her that I am the mom and she is not, that she might be somebody’s mom someday but for now, that’s not her job.

If you wear glasses, a quick nod of the head down and looking out over the top can suffice. Or a slight nod of the head while widening your eyes. As a bossy child myself I am well informed about the nature of The Mom Look.

Not to get off-topic, but my eldest is a four-year-old boy and is struggling with another manners problem: backtalk. He will obstinately say the opposite of what we say to him. Sometimes it’s even funny: upon overhearing someone say “Gnome, Alaska,” he said, “Yes malaska!” Flush the toilet contents down? He wants to flush them up. But mostly, it’s “No come inside!” “No pee on the potty!” “No eat my dinner!” “Yes grab the cat!” and, with the reminder/warning “That’s backtalk,” he’ll spurt, “No backtalk!”

My husband and I are exasperated and bemused. Initially we tried ignoring it, but when it became a regular occurrence, we moved on to briefly telling him that backtalk is rude and disrespectful and not to do it (cue more backtalk). Getting stern and punishing continued backtalk does not seem to have helped, but in our inexperience, it’s hard to tell if that’s because we’re being softies or if, as I am starting to suspect, we need to come at things from some different angle. Any advice welcome!

Oh man, I hear you! The sass of the 4-year-old boy is really trying my patience now. I feel like we are saying “what is the most important rule? Listen the first time” on repeat constantly. Sometimes he doesn’t respond at all (tough, because he has some hearing loss so I really don’t know if he even heard me.) But most of the time he responds in a sassy obnoxious voice or responds with phrases like “eyeball.”

I default to punishments like no videos or TV for a day or two (which is convenient because I hate turning it on anyways) but I’m really not sure if that works so well for him. Complimenting and praising when he does listen the first time seems to help in the short-term, but when he’s in a loop it really doesn’t stop the bad behavior. Preventing the triggers (being tired, being left to his own devices too long) does seem to alleviate the behavior but I can’t always be occupying them or making sure he sleeps perfectly all night.

I feel like my parenting discipline repertoire is so limited. Plus I feel like I second-guess myself because I’m just not sure what’s normal at this age. I know as a 4-year-old girl I was not this sassy — but I’m much more of a rule-follower by nature. And a girl.

We found with our boys that the phrase”I’ll wait for you.” said in a calm but firm voice works wonders. It takes away the power of the defiant stand off. So, if we say it’s time to wash hands for dinner and they refuse, we just say that. They get to do nothing else until they’ve finished what we’ve asked. If they want to do something before they’ve completed the task, we say calmly but firmly, “I’ll know you’re ready for that once you’ve finished x.” They know we’ll follow through. It’s hard sometimes to stay calm, but as the alpha, the little naughty behaviors can’t shake me. I’ve learned quite a bit from observing our older son’s karate lessons. The master never flinches when the children do naughty things. He corrects them, doles out a punishment (usually push ups) and moves on with the lesson. It takes him 10 seconds.

Amelia, this sort of habit is so frustrating! Yes, it can be funny, but who wants this to be the way everyone interacts!

I recommend, in order but also just according to what works, the following.

Explain calmly that it’s naughty to say anything other than “Yes, Mama” or “Yes, Papa” (and honestly, there is nothing wrong with the Southern “Yes Ma’am” or “Yes, Sir”!)
Then say, “You have a bad habit of answering us disrespectfully. You need to stop, as I’ve told you before. From now on, you will get a punishment if you do it — no warning, because you are old enough to understand, and I’m not going to explain it again.”

It’s important to understand that the *explaining* and the lectures ENABLE the behavior. Instead, you need a quick response to counter the behavior.

So the next time you have a directive, you say, “I’m going to tell you do something now; if you give me backtalk, which means saying No when you should be saying Yes [or whatever fits here], you will get a punishment, so don’t be surprised! To avoid that terrible outcome, just answer me respectfully by saying ‘Yes, Mama’.” Then give the directive.

If he answers with backtalk, immediately, with NO WARNING, do one of the following:

1. Put him in his room. Physically, without a word, march him up there. Then tell him you’re setting a timer and you will get him when you are ready. Leave. The problem here is that he’s interacting in an unpleasant way, but he is interacting. Removing him from the situation can be a reset. However, completely banishing a child is really hard on him, and should be the last resort. On the other hand, sometimes some silence can elicit the desire to do better, and a reset of bad behaviors.

2. Put him in a corner. This is my preferred punishment for 4 yos. You can keep an eye on them but they are removed from the action (they have to face the corner, not sure if that is clear to everyone). They experience the agony of hearing all the fun going on but not being able to take part. If it’s a battle to carry this out, put a stool there and make him stand on the stool. Somehow that’s more immobilizing.

3. Give him a swift spanking. Be sure it counts. Spank and then move on with your directive. If he answers with backtalk again, see #1 or #2. (You can search “spanking in the search box if you want a more elaborate explanation and defense of spanking.)

4. Ignore him. It’s useful to give a directive that actually results in a benefit for him, such as “Please go wash up for lunch.” If he is naughty, well, he’ll also be hungry. Kids can sense when they have the upper hand because YOU want the thing you’re asking for, and they don’t. So try to leverage their desires to practice good behavior and learn new habits.

5. I like Laura’s comment about her kids’ karate dojo. Interestingly, hierarchical modes have not been eliminated from sports and the military! We can indeed learn from them and regain the knowledge for family life.

Dad can certainly dole out pushups. It’s fun to learn them together at some other time. Moms can require jumping jacks. (I mean, whatever, but somehow pushups are very masculine, and jumping jacks are inherently funny, which can change the atmosphere from exasperated to hilarious, and after all, he just wants to amuse you! I mean, when he’s not trying to make you insane.)

Of course, in the family we act with kindness and love, but firmness and discipline are still needed.

In short, stop explaining and start exacting a price for bad behavior.

This may seem like a dumb question, but how do you remember the consequences you have set up in advance? I’m always devising a consequence and other than the “no TV for 24 hours” or “in your room” I actually can’t remember it in the moment. I write it down and email myself but then the notebook is usually in some other room when the situation occurs and turning on my computer to check the consequences removes the immediate nature of things.

Tia, this is why I actually don’t believe in elaborate consequences and threats. Who can remember?
Notice the ones I mention above. Room, corner, spanking, ignoring, pushups/jumping jacks. You could also do stairs if you have stairs.
Nothing elaborate. You can decide right at the moment. Do you need a break from this kid? Off to his room he goes. Does he need to know that everyone is having fun without his obnoxious behavior? In the corner where he can hear but not see. Is he pushing buttons? Ignore. Does he seem a bit frantic? Jumping jacks (and maybe running around the outside of the house 5 times).
Stop threatening and depriving. It doesn’t work! (They shouldn’t be watching that much TV anyway.)

A stool in the corner! I can’t wait to try this. Getting my 2yo son to face the corner is an epic battle every time I send him to time out and the entire punishment spirals out of control (which my husband just can’t understand. When he says go to time out and the 2yo does exactly what he’s supposed to do. For me….not so much).
Thanks so much for your wisdom – and confirmation that what we’re already doing is on point and just needs to be consistent.

Thank you so much for the advice and encouragement, Leila! Three days ago I gave the Last Warning Ever for backtalk. There have been a few back-to-back timeouts, but nothing too nightmarish. I also hadn’t used standing in the corner before but you’re right, it’s a good option. Great for when locking him in his room or a spank seems excessive but he still needs to understand the meaning of “no.”

The “gentle parenting” set and the “teach them to obey because they love you, not out of fear of punishment” ideas make a lot of sense to me and there are large families who talk about how well that works…but…they’re short on details and I haven’t figured out any way to apply that to my actual life, particularly with a little boy still sorting out receptive language issues. He needs something he can understand, and reasonable punishments align his understanding in a way that a barrage of words does not at. all. Your practical wisdom is much appreciated!

I can still hear my mom telling my sister and me that our younger brother just needed one mom, not three. I think it took years to sink in but finally did. The thought still helps me in moments when I want to set him (happily married, hard working young father of 3 and counting) straight but it’s not my place. :)
Thanks for all your advice. Its interesting too just to hear how you approach and think about these sorts of problems.
Praying for Rosie and that baby!!!

We have a bossy 4 year old girl at our house too! Only she’s the 4th, not oldest. And like auntie Leila said with her bossy daughter, mine (and probably yours) is so kind. The bossiness is really part of trying to serve others. She just needs to learn what’s actually of service and what isn’t! And “the temperament” books are so good. With every temperament, there are strengths and weaknesses. We have each of the four represented at our house, and we have noticed and talked to our children about the differences – one being that cholerics need to watch their bossiness, melancholics need to watch their whinyness, sanguines need to watch their tendency to interrupt, and phlegmatics need to answer when spoken to. They are all annoying “tendencies,” but I think bossiness stands out as the most annoying, but really my 4 year old “boss” doesn’t whine like some others. She can interrupt, but not like my sanguine. And she has no problem answering when spoken to (or not spoken to). So, maybe try to focus on the positive of what she/he doesn’t struggle with! :)

This was amazing advice. I have a “bossy” 6 year old (oldest of 4). Although I don’t like the word bossy, it does describe her behavior.
I have naturally used a lot of these patterns of correction “Ask, don’t tell” “I’m the mom, not you, he’s fine. I’ll say something when I notice” or “quiet now, he’s trying to talk” or “let him try, you got to learn when you were 4”. It has all really helped. She is so kind and loving. I try to give her extra responsibility (and rewards) and she thrives. She can get her brothers breakfast, help me cook, change over laundry, sweep and mop, start her own school work. She is truly an amazing child so these minor corrections don’t bother me too much and it makes the family more peaceful so the little brothers don’t have to respond with silence or outbursts! You summarized how it can affect family interactions so perfectly.

We tried explaining to our eldest (then 6 yo) that bossing is annoying and people resent it, but she just wasn’t getting it. I know this in anathema to some people, so please hold the tomatoes, but we showed her an episode of the Smurfs. Brainy Smurf has always stuck in my mind as the quintessential obnoxious, smug, bossy know it all. Her initial reaction was shock – “Mommy, Brainy was just trying to help and they threw him out of the village!” So I told her, “No, Brainy wasn’t helping, he was bossy and trying to control everyone. Nobody likes being bossed.” After seeing a few episodes, it finally clicked. Whenever I heard her bossing, I’d give her the look and say “Brainy Smurf!” She’d laugh and back off. It was pretty effective. I’m sure there are better examples somewhere in classic literature or in some fancy curriculum, but hey, we work with what we have. ;)

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